In recent weeks, there has been a lot of intense lobbying for positions in government from within the political class.
Some of those putting themselves forward are established Kenya Kwanza stalwarts, who were somehow left out in the initial division of the spoils.
Yet others are politicians who a few months ago were busy insulting Dr William Ruto; but now that he is President, they feel no shame in executing a swift U-turn and seeking a juicy appointive position from him.
And many ordinary Kenyans seem to be both furious and disgusted at this spectacle of desperate place-seeking, even among people whose tenure in public life goes all the way back to the Moi era.
So why do they do it?
I have a theory on this. But first, let me tell you an illustrative story from my younger days.
A friend of mine told me a story about his uncle’s trip to the UK, back in the late 1970s, to visit some family friends; a British family that had at one point lived in Kenya.
While staying with his friends, he was told that they had an invitation to tea with an elderly couple who lived just down the road who were always keen to meet anyone from Africa.
The reason for this was that they had lived and worked in Africa for many years, ending with the man being appointed as the governor of a small Southern African nation which was a British colony.
My uncle’s friend came from that afternoon tea with a story which he was to repeat many times once back in Kenya. First, is that the wife of this former governor had taken the trouble to bake a special cake for him. And second is that he had actually walked past that house once already and seen the old man mowing his lawn.
Now if you do not find this amazing, then you probably do not know that in the colonial era, the governors of the various African colonies were imperial proconsuls. They had an army at their disposal; could create laws more or less as they pleased; and in general, had virtually limitless power over the “natives”.
The kind elderly lady who had baked the cake for her Kenyan guest had almost certainly ruled over a household with at least a dozen domestic servants. Her husband would have moved about in royal fashion when attending to his official duties. And yet here they were, with him mowing his lawn quite cheerfully, and his wife doing her own baking.
The point of this story is to illustrate the world of difference between British political culture (at least as it existed in those days) and Kenyan political culture as it exists now.
In Britain, there was no shame in returning to a fairly modest life at the end of your service in the colonies and giving up all those aristocratic privileges to which you had grown accustomed.
Indeed, if this former governor had upon his retirement been revealed to possess great (and unexplained) wealth, his neighbours and friends may well have shunned him, recognising that he must have obtained this fortune by stealing it.
In other words, the possibility of retaining the respect of your peers and your personal dignity despite no longer living the viceregal lifestyle formed a very real barrier to the looting of public coffers by men who back then had more power than the democratically elected presidents who succeeded them.
Compare that with the current situation in Kenya where we basically take it for granted that all the county governors are millionaires.
And any county governor who has either served two terms or perhaps lost his seat in last year’s election, will strive by all means to get appointed to a job that will support the lifestyle he has grown accustomed to.
They cling to hopes of retaining the chauffeured giant black Toyota 'VX' Land Cruisers or latest model Mercedes Benz – fuelled and maintained at public expense. And a suitable baronial residence in some serene suburb. With plenty of servants of course.
Because in our political culture, if you lose these emblems of high office, people do not respect you.
They laugh at you.
